


you may love me like a saint

by alderations



Series: indigo [4]
Category: The Mechanisms (Band)
Genre: Aftercare, Breathplay, Choking, Creampie, Deepthroating, Enthusiastic Consent, Extremely Bad Psychology Do Not Try This At Home, Kink Negotiation, Murder Kink, Other, Riding, Rough Sex, Temporary Character Death, Unsafe Sex Between Immortals, im not sure if thats different from murderplay? sexy murder regardless, polymechs but not enough to put in the tag
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-19
Updated: 2020-08-19
Packaged: 2021-03-06 04:48:13
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,997
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25987687
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alderations/pseuds/alderations
Summary: All things considered, Lyfrassir is adjusting to immortality with more grace than any of the Mechanisms ever had. The endless void of life is nothing compared to the endless void of Yog-Sothoth, after all, and the longer they cope with their own inherent eldritchness, the more they start to wonder if it’s been a part of them all along. Ironically, the only thing that bothers them at this point is dying.
Relationships: Lyfrassir Edda/Marius von Raum
Series: indigo [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1869556
Comments: 43
Kudos: 134





	you may love me like a saint

**Author's Note:**

> warnings: it's sexy murder, specifically choking/throat trauma, in pretty explicit detail. also PiV sex, creampies, and accidentally hurting someone during sex (more than intended).

All things considered, Lyfrassir is adjusting to immortality with more grace than any of the Mechanisms ever had. The endless void of life is nothing compared to the endless void of Yog-Sothoth, after all, and the longer they cope with their own inherent eldritchness, the more they start to wonder if it’s been a part of them all along. Ironically, the only thing that bothers them at this point is dying.

The first time they die on the Aurora, it’s because Raphaella flipped the wrong switch in her lab and flooded the ship with chlorine gas, so a typical Thursday, all things considered. But the Bifrost, for whatever reason, does its work with deadly efficiency, and Lyf heaves a desperate breath nearly as soon as Aurora realizes what’s gone wrong and recycles the air with fresh oxygen. They wake up alone, surrounded by the bodies of their crew, and all they can do is scream.

Jonny joins them within the minute, claiming that even the dead can’t sleep through their wailing, but they don’t even start to calm down until the rest of the crew is conscious and clustered around them, confused and uneasy. Once their breathing finally starts to slow, Marius folds them into a tight hug and feels them melt, boneless, in his arms. Waking up surrounded by your dead friends is scary, he figures, and they can talk about it later, when the rest of the crew isn’t up in their business.

Lyf doesn’t want to talk about it. They clam up and refuse to explain their panic that night, and the next month when a bullet ricochets off of Brian’s plating and hits them in the face, and a year later when a would-be bandit sneaks onto the Aurora and snaps their neck before they notice the footsteps creeping up on them. (Needless to say, when Lyf wakes up thirty seconds later, already screaming, the bandit knows something’s gone horribly wrong. Marius insists that they keep the man alive for as long as possible while Raphaella uses him as a lab rat, and she’s inclined to agree.)

Another half a dozen deaths come and go, and Lyf is inconsolable every time. Marius starts to wonder if they shouldn’t be involved in quite so many of their more deadly criminal activities, when finally Lyf works up the courage to say something.

“Marius,” they start, looking him in the eyes for a fraction of a second before their nerves take over again. “I. I’d like for you to kill me. Please.”

They’re curled up together on a sofa in the common room, enjoying the soft ambience after a relatively bloodless movie night and trading languid kisses. Tim is asleep on the other end of the sofa, his feet tucked under Lyf’s thighs, while Ivy works her way through a stack of books in a nearby armchair. She doesn’t show any sign of overhearing their conversation, though it takes a lot to distract her in general. “What? What do you mean? Like, right now?”

“Not necessarily,” Lyf reasons. “I just think that… well, you’ve seen what happens when I die.”

Marius nods. “Makes sense, given your first several deaths involved melting flesh and the end of the world and all that.”

They wince, but keep going before Marius can backtrack. “Yeah. That’s—it’s—I don’t really want to talk about it, and I know, you keep saying I  _ should,  _ but I don’t want to relive it, I guess? But yeah, every time I come back I think I’m being executed again. It’s fucking terrifying. And you’re—you’re all a  _ lot,  _ but you’re still people who love me, and I forget that. Every time.”

“Doesn’t help that you heal so fast,” Marius mumbles. Lyf is almost always the first one to come back, and the first one to be killed again, if their enemies are persistent enough. “Regardless. Even in the hands of a skilled professional such as myself”—Ivy snorts at this, so she must be listening after all—“this isn’t the kind of controlled environment where you’d want to try exposure therapy. There are  _ far  _ too many factors in play when your whole brain is rebooting every time.”

Apparently the scientific approach was not what Lyf wanted out of this conversation, because they roll their eyes and bonk their head lightly into his shoulder. “I’m not asking for exposure therapy. I’m just asking you to kill me. Just once, and if it works, maybe again. I think—I think if it was someone safe, someone I literally trust with my life, I could have something else to think about next time.”

“That’s definitely not how brains work,” Marius argues, betrayed by his wobbly voice. Lyf is more vocal about their feelings than most of the Aurora’s crew, and it always catches him by surprise.

“Marius. I don’t care. I’m asking you to try it with me, if you’re okay with it. And if you’re not, I’ll get Jonny or Tim to do it, since I know they’d jump at the chance, but I trust you to have a bit more, uh, tact.”

Marius glances over Lyf’s head, at where Tim’s hair is spilling over his face and off the edge of the sofa. There is very little tact to be found in Gunpowder Tim. “That’s fair. What were you... envisioning?”

At this, Lyf ducks away from Marius’s gaze, face red, and he tamps down the unexpected thrill in his chest. Ivy hasn’t turned a page in two minutes. “I thought we could… we could, uh. Y’know what you were talking about the other day? That one time that Jonny, um… Jonny…”

“The time we fucked him to death?”

“Yeah, that.” Lyf swallows. “I don’t want the exact same thing, ‘cause it sounds like that was a  _ lot,  _ but something like that?”

Ivy’s not even pretending to read anymore, as evidenced by her eyes peeking over the edge of her book to stare Marius down. “There are plenty of options there,” he replies, glaring at her while rubbing Lyf’s back with a gentle hand. “I might’ve been more amenable in the first place if you told me it was a sex thing.”

“Well—I—when you mentioned that with Jonny, I thought—I had a… reaction to it. Um. And I thought, well, if I’m interested in murder in  _ that  _ context, maybe it’d be okay, and then I could. Yeah. But I didn’t want to bring it up like  _ that  _ and have you psychoanalyze me about it and—”

“I wouldn’t—”

“They’re absolutely right,” Ivy interjects. Marius turns to glare at her. “What? They’re my partner, too. They deserve to be protected from your malpractice.”

The look on his face can only be described as a pout, not that Marius would admit it. “I’ll show you malpractice, you nosy dick,” he grumbles.

“Yeah, I think you’re going to have to get Raph in on that one. Not really my thing.”

Marius rolls his eyes. “Lyf, shall we take this conversation somewhere else? Perhaps where there aren’t any archivists to get overly invested?”

“Sure.” Lyf extracts themself from Tim’s legs and sticks their tongue out at Ivy as they leave the common room, heading for their pod. They spend the walk in silence, except for Marius’s near-constant commentary on everything around them, lacing their fingers in his when he offers his hand.

Once they’re finally in their own space, Lyf relaxes visibly. “So,” Marius picks up again, “you want me to kill you in a horny way. Are you open to suggestions? Brainstorms?”

Lyf leans into him, still holding on to his hand, as they make their way toward the bedroom. “I guess? I know that—well, you know what I like.”

“You like getting fucked, and you said—”

“I didn’t mean in general!” Their frustrated scowl is so cute that Marius has to kiss them on the nose, just to watch it scrunch up at him. “Like, what are the ways that I could’ve feasibly died in bed with you already? Because I know there are a lot.”

Marius puts a hand to his chin in exaggerated contemplation. “How many times have you nearly fallen off my dick in the shower?”

“Alright, that’s—you’ve done that too. Shut up.”

The bedroom door slides open in front of them, and closes as soon as they step across the threshold, giving Marius room to turn and brace Lyf against it. “Fair point. Also, that  _ one  _ time when you kept a cockring on me for three hours, I did start to worry that one of us was going to have a heart attack.”

“Yes, because you’re extremely dramatic.”

“And,” Marius continues, ignoring their teasing, “I don’t know if this is what you were going for, but you seem to be stubbornly attached to this idea that humans don’t actually need air to survive.”

Their lips part involuntarily, and Marius knows that he’s getting somewhere, even if they’re being a tease about it. “Look, if I pass out while deepthroating you, it’s your fault for having such a nice dick.”

Just like that, said dick goes from  _ decidedly interested  _ to  _ very very hard.  _ “Is that what you want? Or you just want me to choke you?”

“I—I want you to choke me,” they respond, softer now. Marius is fully leaning against the door, forearms boxing Lyf in, and he leans down to nip at their throat while they talk. “I think that’s what… that’s what I’d enjoy the most. If that makes sense? Could you actually do that without backing out, though?”

Marius laughs darkly. “Lyf, sweetheart, I love you to Hel and back, but you don’t make it this long as a Mechanism without learning how to kill the people you love. That being said, which hand would you prefer? The feeling of the metal can be a lot, but I have more control over it, too. Especially if you start struggling.”

His voice drops deep into his chest on the last few words, and if Lyf was uncertain before, they’re  _ absolutely  _ into this now. “I like the metal one,” they breathe against Marius’s lips. “I like—I want to feel like you can control me. Like you can do whatever you want with me.” Marius cuts them off with a searing kiss, wrapping one hand around their braid and tugging their head back so that he has a better angle from which to devour them.

“We’re going to talk about this,” he insists. “I don’t think we should try this tonight. Actually—you might ask Tim for advice, he’s done things like this before. I mean, he—he had a really hard time dying at first, too. From what I’ve heard. Either way, I want to make sure that you’re comfortable the entire time, or, well, as comfortable as you can be. Okay?”

“Yeah.” Their dark eyes are fixed on Marius’s face, and he has to wonder if they heard anything he just said. The intensity in their eyes is already screaming  _ fuck me fuck me fuck me,  _ so when they breathe the words into his lips, he’s not surprised. They don’t even make it to the bed. Lyf has to stand on tiptoe to get Marius inside them, and he presses their face against the door and squeezes their throat in soft pulses just to see how they react as he grinds up into them. It takes them all of five minutes to come, clenching around him and biting their fist to muffle their cries, and before Marius can even react, they’re on their knees and finishing him off with his cock down their throat.

Once they’re cleaned up and in bed, Lyf starts brainstorming again. “I think I’d like to ride you.”

“Just in general, or…?”  
“No, while you kill me,” they reply, flicking him on the shoulder. “I want to be able to see you, obviously. And that way I can be close to you, but I also have space to get off quickly if I need to.”

Marius nods, feeling Lyf’s nose brush the back of his head with the movement. “Makes sense. Just the two of us? Are we inviting anyone else?”

This is a trickier question, given Lyf’s hesitation. “We could have someone… on call, so to speak. Maybe Tim, since you said he did the same thing? Or Ashes. They’ve been really good with my—with my, uh, death anxiety. If you could call it that.”

“Fair. And I assume—well, I think we should just do it here. So you can wake up somewhere safe. And, uh, every member of this crew could absolutely fuck things up if they happened to walk in at the wrong moment.”

Lyf makes a sound in their throat that could be amusement or arousal. “Maybe if it goes well the first time, then we… I guess where we see where things go from there. I can think of some o-other things I’d like to try.”

“Oh?” Marius’s cock makes a valiant attempt at hardening as he ponders the implications.

“You’ll just have to wait and find out. Horny bastard.”

He can’t argue with that, and besides, he always starts to doze off within minutes when Lyf wraps themself around him like a benevolent octokitten. They’ll talk more in the morning, he knows, and he has no intention of helping Lyf with their plans until he knows exactly what they want from him.

Another week passes before Lyf decides that they’re actually ready, and that’s enough time for Marius’s anticipation to build to something that sits, thick and feverish, in his chest. Lyf clearly feels the same—they’re insatiable on the best of days, but when Marius walks in on them pegging Tim one morning and riding Ashes’ strap that same afternoon, on opposite ends of the ship no less, he knows they’re just as worked up as he is.

“I’m ready to die,” they inform him the next night, throwing the door open with all the fanfare of an actual execution. They’re wearing an old button-down that, until recently, belonged to Marius, and nothing else, which counters the effect nicely. “Is—is now a good time?”

Marius has to remind his mouth how to make words. “Absolutely,” he affirms, taking in the strip of dark hair across Lyf’s chest where the open shirt shows off a bit of cleavage. “Did you let Tim know?”

“Yes.” After having a long conversation with Tim (separate from fucking him, as they assured Marius), they’d decided that he would, in fact, be the best person to go to in case of an emergency, and Marius has to agree that he has plenty of experience on both sides of what they have planned. “I’m going to do my hair up a bit tighter so it doesn’t get caught in your hand. Just in case. Will you make sure you’re ready to clean up?”

Lyf has requested that Marius stay by their side from the moment they die until they’re ready to go back to the rest of the world, so according to their plan, Marius sets a couple glasses of water and some washcloths on a nearby table so he’s ready to take care of Lyf after they’re done. Meanwhile, they unbutton their shirt the rest of the way and slide it off their shoulders, which means that Marius turns around to find them sitting naked on the bed and carefully braiding their hair in a diagonal down the back of their head. Their strong arms, their soft belly, the curve of their hips as they slouch to one side—Marius fights the urge to drop to his knees and kiss every inch of them. “You are so beautiful I can’t describe it,” he says instead, feeling both corny and like he can’t possibly say enough at the same time.

“Mmph.” They tie their braid off behind their neck and look up at him, eyes swimming with heat. “You’re wearing clothes.”

“I have been known to do that on a regular basis, yes.”

No matter how much planning they put in, they can’t take the Marius out of Marius. “I’d like to see you naked, please.”

Marius opens his mouth to sass them, but finds himself unable to respond with anything but a “yessir” when they rake their eyes up and down his body and slide closer to the edge of the bed. It takes a long, awkward minute to escape from all his layers, while Lyf, a smirk playing on their lips, lets their knees fall to the side and starts rubbing two fingers in light circles around their clit.

“May I touch?” Marius asks as soon as his last sock is gone, and Lyf comes to sit at the edge of the bed. They nod, licking their lips, and instead of reaching down to add his fingers to their own, he presses one fingertip into their mouth to feel the way they work it over with their tongue. His nerves tingle. “You’re so good for me,” he whispers, pulling his finger out of Lyf’s mouth and tracing it down their neck and around the side of one breast. “Going to look so lovely dying on my cock.”

Lyf’s breathing stutters. “I want to,” they reply, and Marius has a feeling he’s going to be hearing that a lot tonight.

When his hand finally makes its way down to their groin, they’re already rutting against their own fingers, seeking friction that he won’t give them yet. He lets them grind for a minute, sure, but then he wraps his hand around Lyf’s wrist and pulls them both away. “Can’t have you wearing yourself out too soon,” he says with a grin. “Can I fuck your mouth, beloved?”

“Please,” they moan.

Marius stays standing next to the bed, while Lyf sinks down onto their elbows and comes face-to-face with his cock. They start with gentle licks at the head, teasing the underside and lapping precum from the tip, but once Marius’s breathing turns ragged, they plunge the whole thing into their throat without warning. Marius yelps.  _ “Fuck,  _ Lyf, if you don’t warn me I’m g-gonna fuckin’ come!”

They roll their eyes, though he can’t tell if that’s at his words or because he’s hit the back of their mouth. Then they’re swallowing around him, reaching one hand up to feel the way he fills their throat, and all reason is lost in favor of groaning and clawing at their head. In the back of his mind, Marius realizes that re-braiding their hair was a good idea. More prescient, he wants to come so deep in their mouth that they have no choice but to swallow. And he almost does, until they pull back with one hand gripping the base of his cock like iron.

“Nice try,” they laugh, voice hoarse. “Not getting off that easy. Get comfy for me, will you?”

As they agreed, Marius takes up his place at the head of the bed, leaning back against the pillows, while Lyf works the tension out of their jaw. Their face and cheeks are flushed red now, and Marius can see a dribble of wetness shining on their thigh as they turn around and scoot back toward him on their knees. As soon as they’re in range, they lean forward to kiss him, mouth open and hands grabbing at Marius wherever they can reach. He pulls them in by their hips, then settles them in his lap, holding them back with a hand on their chest when they try to reach for his cock again.

“One more time,” he interrupts their protests. “Safewords?”

“Green is good. Like right now.” They get like this sometimes, so hungry for something to fill them that they struggle to think about anything else. Marius waits until they stop wriggling and meet his eyes, because he needs them to be present, at least for the moment. “Y-yellow for slow down and check in. Red for stop.”

Marius nods and kisses their cheek. “Mhm. If you can’t talk?”

“Tap once for go, twice for stop. Three—three times if I need you to k-kill me immediately.”

That was an interesting concept to introduce to Lyf, but they agreed that it was a good safeword to have, even if Marius doesn’t plan on dragging out their suffering for too long. “Good. And the same goes for me, yeah?”

“Of course,” Lyf breathes, already leaning back toward him. Marius moves the hand that’s keeping them restrained, tangling in their hair instead and pulling them close. “Please can I—please,  _ Marius.” _

He brushes a thumb down the side of their face and finally lets them settle into his chest. “Please what, love?”

“In-inside me,” they whine. One of their hands is already gripping his cock and trying, though clumsily, to line it up with themself. “You. Want you. Inside. Now.”

Good with their words as always. Marius finally lets go of their hip, giving them more freedom to move, and they sink down onto him with a sigh as if they’re drinking their first drop of water in days.

“That better?” Marius teases, though his voice comes out breathy as Lyf settles around him with a little squeeze. “Oh.  _ Wow,  _ you are wet.”

“Told you I was into this,” they murmur, somehow more coherent now that they’re getting fucked. “I can’t wait, Marius. I want you to  _ use _ me already.”

Marius lets out a slow breath through his nose. “I know, just— _ fuck _ —take your time, love. There’s no rush.”

That comes across as a challenge, apparently, because Lyf leans forward into his chest and starts riding him at an agonizing pace, rising up until his cock nearly slips out of them and then sliding down slow enough that Marius can feel them twitching around him as he fills them again and again, their cunt making soft, wet sounds every time. Their lips move against his skin in silent patterns that could be words or just open-mouthed kisses; Marius is too focused on holding himself together to notice.

Within minutes, Lyf’s resolve starts to wear away, until they’re grinding down on him with all the enthusiasm that Marius has come to expect from them. When their voice rises from a whisper to a needy whine, Marius reaches down to trace two fingers along the edge of their hole, feeling the way they stretch tight around him and shudder at the contact. He teases Lyf with gentle touches, gathering their wetness, and then changes tactics and pinches their clit with slick but firm fingers. “M— _ ah!”  _ they yelp, grabbing Marius’s shoulders and shaking in his lap. He’s not too cruel a lover, he figures, as he lets go and rubs them in rhythmic circles instead. “Fu- _ uck  _ Marius I’m. I’m gonna come already, how do you  _ do  _ this to me…”

“You do it to yourself, sweetheart, fucking me  _ so  _ nicely. You can come. Come for me, Lyf, then I’ll start choking you, okay?”

Their eyes widen at the promise, before they press their face into his neck and come with a stuttered moan. Marius has to close his eyes, because he knows full well that he will  _ also _ finish if he watches them fall apart on his cock, but he can’t help bucking into them a few times to hear how they gasp and whimper. Then he pulls his hand away from their clit, licks his fingers clean, and rests his hand across their throat—lightly, barely giving them any pressure, but that doesn’t stop them from leaning into it and squirming on top of him.

“I thought you were gonna use your metal hand,” they complain as Marius starts to squeeze, just enough that he knows their head will go a little fuzzy.

“Maybe I want to feel what I’m doing first, hm? Let me take my time with you.” That’s enough encouragement for them to go a bit boneless in his lap, so Marius tightens his grip and watches their face flush and their eyes roll back. “Oh, that’s  _ gorgeous,”  _ he breathes. “So beautiful for me. Can’t wait to kill you just like that.”

The sound they make is so obscene that Marius lets go of their throat just to hear it. “Why—stopped?” they groan, reaching for his hand as if to put it back themself.

“I just like to hear you, love. And besides,” he pauses for dramatic effect, “you wanted me to switch hands, after all.”

This time, when he chokes them, they can’t make a sound. His metal hand isn’t as sensitive as the flesh one, but the sensors he  _ does  _ have give him a strange flood of information—the firm resistance of their trachea in contrast with the give of muscle around it, the blood fighting through constricted arteries, the way they twitch as their body instinctively fights for air. He has so much power over them, and they give it up without question, which only makes Marius more aware of how painfully hard he is right now. As soon as their eyes start to lose focus, he lets go again, grabbing their hips and delivering a few sharp thrusts as they cough and splutter above him.

“Th-that feels,” they pant, still catching their breath, “so  _ fucking  _ good. Harder,  _ please,  _ I-I wanna feel you… d-deep…” They’re barely able to string words together, which means that Marius is doing a great job, all things considered. Already, he can see their stomach spasming as they approach another orgasm, so he starts palming their clit again as he returns his metal hand to their throat and squeezes harder.

They gag for a second and then go quiet. “You’re so good for me, Lyf,” he soothes, pushing down the heat building in his own chest. “Can you come again before I choke you out, I wonder? Maybe if I get a better angle… Can I turn us around?” He lets go of them and gives them enough time and oxygen to think before they nod an affirmative. “Good. Thank you, beloved. I’ll keep you in my lap, okay? I just think I can fuck you deeper if I have more room to move.”

He’s not sure if Lyf licks their lips intentionally, but he takes it as a good sign. Wrapping one arm around their waist, Marius gets his knees under himself and turns them both so that he can press Lyf into the wall and pin them there as he snaps his hips into them, growing more erratic by the minute. His hand is still lingering on their throat, not cutting off air, but letting them lean into the sensation. “Gonna come,” they whine, voice already wrecked.

“Is that so? I can help with that, dear.” Marius pecks them on the lips and then returns his flesh hand to their clit and just leaves it there, letting them rut against him until they’re barely on the edge once again. At this point, Marius knows that he can’t keep himself together if they come on his cock again, so he pulls his hand away from their neck to check in one last time. “Do you want me to—to finish…?”

They nod so fast that it clearly makes them a bit dizzy, and they have to brace their hands on his shoulders for a moment. “Please.  _ Please.” _

“Please what? I need you to say it for me. Can you do that?”

For a moment, he worries that they’re already too hazy to answer, but then their eyes focus on him as they pull themself together. “Strangle me. Kill me, Marius, I w-want to come while you’re— _ ngh.” _

That’s all the encouragement he needs to clamp down on their throat again, no longer measuring the pressure in his metal fingers. “Oh—oh,  _ fuck,”  _ he moans, suddenly overcome by the way they tighten and throb around him, and he’s going to come any moment now but he wants them to enjoy this first—he thrusts into them as deep as he can manage and rubs their clit fast enough that he knows they’d be screaming if they could. Distantly, he feels a rush of warm fluid trickling down their thighs as they come, but that sensation is nothing compared to the way their throat crunches and then  _ gives  _ under his fingers. Their eyes roll back in their head, and Marius thinks he might’ve broken skin, and for some infinite span of seconds he’s just fucking them and  _ holding  _ them and squeezing until their chest starts heaving for air and they grow impossibly tight. “L-Lyf, I’m gonna—I’m— _ fuck!” _

In the moment, Marius is certain that he’s never come this hard. Lyf is still twitching on top of him, but by the time he comes back to himself, panting and shaking, they’ve stopped moving altogether. Their mouth is open, a tiny strand of drool leaking from one corner, and… with a jolt, Marius realizes that their throat is a wreck. Not only did his metal fingers pierce skin, but he can feel their trachea crunching under his hand in a way that is definitely not conducive to, well, being alive. “Shit,” he breathes, wincing as he pulls his hand back. “Oh shit  _ fuck  _ that’s—I didn’t mean to do that, we didn’t talk about that, they’re gonna— _ shit shit shit.  _ Okay, Marius. Keep it together.”

Despite the guilt welling up in his chest, he needs to focus on taking care of them while they’re still out, so he suppresses his emotions like only a Mechanism can and assesses the damage. Strands of rainbow are already weaving between the blood leaking from Lyf’s throat, which is a good sign. Marius grabs a pillow from the far side of the bed and gently nestles it behind Lyf as he pulls out of them, mentally calculating how much time he has before they wake up. Enough time to get them reasonably clean, he figures. He slides off the bed and heads for the supplies he prepared before they started, bringing one glass of water over to the bedside table and using the other to wet a washcloth, which he then uses to wipe the blood from their throat and the stickiness from their thighs. When their eyelids start to flutter, he kisses them on the forehead and tosses the rag to the side, curling up next to them to wait.

It takes a few minutes longer than he expected, during which Marius stares, entranced, at the rainbow pulses shifting under their skin while they heal. Eventually their eyes flicker open, their limbs jolt, and Marius braces himself for the inevitable scream, but what comes out of their mouth is more of a soft whistle. He props himself up on one elbow so he’s in their line of sight, knowing that it’ll help them stay calm, and from that angle he can see that they’re more confused than scared.

“Welcome back, Lyf,” he says, studying the way their eyes zigzag across his face. They reach one hand up to feel at their neck, which looks normal at this point, but Marius knows that immortal bodies can heal in weird ways. “It’s okay if you can’t talk yet. Take your time.”

They clear their throat a couple times and then visibly relax when their voice comes out audible, if gravelly. “Did I… not scream?”

Marius tucks a strand of hair behind their ear and settles back into the pillows to cuddle them better. “I’m, uh. I don’t know if you could.”

“What do you mean?”

Guilt and anxiety threaten to flood Marius again, but he sets his jaw and pushes them aside. He will be honest with Lyf, even if it scares him. “I kinda. Um. I got a bit too… excited? I didn’t mean to, I know we didn’t talk about it and I’m sorry I—I kinda, uh, crushed your throat. With my hand.”

He forces himself to look up, expecting nothing but fear or disgust, but Lyf is watching him with the kind of hunger that usually means they haven’t been fucked in several days. “Marius, that is  _ extremely  _ hot.”

“O-oh.” Crisis averted. “I’m glad to hear it. How are you feeling?”

Lyf rolls their head around in a smooth circle, then stretches their arms out in front of them like a cat. It’s adorable. “I feel  _ really  _ good,” they admit. “I honestly expected that dying would, like, reset my body? That I wouldn’t feel like I’d just been fucked. But I can tell. And my head is so… quiet.”

That’s very good news, since they’re usually overwhelmed with some combination of anxious thoughts and the whisperings of the Bifrost, from what they’ve told Marius. “Good! Did you—you seemed to enjoy it, at least before you, y’know, died. And I’ve definitely never seen you this calm after dying.”

“Neither have I,” they laugh. A shiver runs through them, but they shake their head when Marius reaches for the blankets. “It… That was one of my top five orgasms, for sure. And you seemed  _ very  _ into it, which only makes it better for me. Did—did you come?”

Marius wouldn’t usually blush at that question, but he can’t help himself when he remembers how  _ tight  _ they were in their death throes. “Yeah. Very much so.”

“He very much came,” Lyf snarks under their breath. At the same time, Marius watches them spread their legs and reach down to drag their fingers through the cum sliding out of their cunt. He breathes a series of curses that would have him jailed on a number of planets. “I don’t love being absent for a creampie,” they remark, which somehow makes Marius’s face even redder. “But I’m also  _ deeply  _ turned on by the thought of you coming in me as I died, so I’ll let it slide.”

“As the resident psychologist—”

“Oh  _ do  _ shut up.”

“—that probably says something absurd about you as a person, but I’d be a hypocrite to point it out, so. As your boyfriend, I’m glad I could be of service.”

Lyf laughs in that way that makes their eyes crinkle in the corners, and Marius can’t resist the urge to hug them close and nuzzle their face until they’re shoving his face away and complaining that his beard is tickling them. “Of service,” they grumble into his chest. “Do me a fucking  _ service  _ and—wait, is yours?”

At the sound of his comms dinging, Marius groans and reaches over to snatch them off the bedside table. He has a text from Nastya, which is not the worst possibility, but still weird.  _ Aurora says Lyf died. Everything ok? _

Ah. Sometimes he forgets that the Aurora has more blackmail material than any sentient being should be able to contain. He types up a reply immediately, because the ship is a blabbermouth and he doesn’t want to get on her bad side.  _ Yes :) all according 2 plan. No worriez _

_ Ew,  _ Nastya responds. Typical.

Lyf, who’s been reading his screen upside down the whole time, rolls their eyes and bonks their head against his. “You don’t have to torment Nastya like that, you know.”

“She absolutely deserves it. Don’t start taking her side now!”

“You have another text,” they respond with a laugh, prodding his comms until he looks down and snorts at the message.

It’s Jonny:  _ wait lyf is down 4 sexc murder now?!!?!?!?1? _

When Marius looks up at them, he expects them to be irritated at Nastya’s light-speed gossip-sharing, but they’re just staring at him with wide eyes and red cheeks. “Remember when I said Jonny doesn’t really dom that often, but sometimes he does and it’s an Event?”

“Yeah,” Lyf breathes.

“I think you might have a way to motivate him, if you so choose.”

Judging by the look they’re giving him and the way they rub their thighs together, Lyf is already planning their own demise once again.

**Author's Note:**

> storytime: when i was in high school i used to have a LOT of nightmares that i had to either decapitate or strangle someone or else they would kill me, and the dream-feeling of crushing a trachea freaked me out for YEARS. and then i guess it turned into a (very hypothetical fantasy) kink. we don't have time to unpack all of THAT but hopefully someone else will also enjoy it??
> 
> anyway. I seriously hesitated to post this and I'm a little scared to hear what people think of it, so if you liked it (or have constructive feedback) drop a comment?? and PLEASE let me know if I missed anything that you'd like tagged! i have definitely set myself up for another fucking sequel to this whole series because I won't shut up about Jonny domming people. *honks clown nose.* this one was really hard to write cuz Brain Machine Broke so hopefully that'll flow easier.
> 
> anyway. take care of yourselves friends. eat a vegetable. drink water. don't spend too much time staring dreamily at pictures of dr baron marius von raum, because look where that's gotten me!
> 
> OH ALSO: title is from Cut the String by Mother Mother, which is a) big Vast energy and b) exactly 5 minutes long perfect for showering and dissociating get it all over with in one fell swoop hell yeah. AND shoutout to the nsfw mechscord for enabling and encouraging my nonsense.


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